PETA Calls for Cruelty Charges Against Restaurants Serving Live Octopuses

Cephalopods Are Chopped Up and Served to Customers While the Animals Are Still Conscious and Writhing and Their Hearts Are Still Beating

For Immediate Release:
April 12, 2010

Contact:
Ashley Byrne 757-622-7382

New York -- Determined to stop restaurants in Manhattan and Queens from chopping up or slowly steaming live octopuses and other animals and then serving them while they're still conscious, PETA Foundation General Counsel Jeff Kerr has fired off letters to the district attorneys of each jurisdiction. Kerr points out that because octopuses feel pain just as acutely as mammals do, the restaurants' practices clearly violate the state's anti-cruelty statute. Some cephalopods have their tentacles cut off while they're still conscious and able to feel pain and then are served while the animals' hearts are still beating. Other animals are slowly steamed in front of customers before their tentacles and upper bodies are cut into small pieces.

"The chef uses scissors to cut off an octopus's tentacles and then serves them on a dish--the octopus's heart keeps beating as the animal writhes and slowly dies," says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. "Given that octopuses are sentient living beings, it is both appalling and unlawful that these restaurants are causing the animals such immense pain and suffering."

Cephalopods have sophisticated nervous systems that are rich with pain receptors. There is no question among those who study the animals that they experience both curiosity and joy as well as fear, anger, and pain.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.